Precise control of epitaxy of graphene by microfabricating SiC substrate

Epitaxial graphene (EG) on SiC is promising owing to a capability to produce high-quality film on a wafer scale. One of the remaining issues is microscopic thickness variation of EG near surface steps, which induces variations in its electronic properties and device characteristics. We demonstrate here that the variations of layer thickness and electronic properties are minimized by using microfabricated SiC substrates which spatially confines the epitaxy. This technique will contribute to the realization of highly reliable graphene devices.